Attuned
Turning an empty course platform into a user-centric learning product educators actually use.
A complete redesign and build of an online training platform for early-childhood educators, for the teachers taking the courses and the volunteer-run team who need it to look after itself.
Role:
End-to-end designer & builder
client:
Attuned / Lucy Daniels Center
tools:
Figma, Descript, WordPress + LearnPress
timeline:
~5 months · Launched: June 2026
Overview
Attuned came to me as a website another agency had built but left unusable: the course platform existed, but there were no courses on it, and the team had no way to create them from a stack of years-old PowerPoints.
I designed and built the whole thing into a working product:
three complete courses (twelve modules)
a refreshed and accessible brand tied back to the Lucy Daniels Center
a platform that runs itself day to day so a volunteer team doesn't have to.
Early on, 34 educators had completed surveys with near-universal positive ratings, and the Center is now funding a twelve-module expansion.
The Challenge
Attuned came to me as a finished-looking website with nothing behind it: a course platform, built by another agency on WordPress and LearnPress, but handed over with no courses on it and no realistic way for the team to add any. The foundation was sound. Everything that would make it usable was missing.
Three things stood in the way:
The team couldn't populate or maintain the site themselves. Everything else depended on this. Attuned is run by a small volunteer team at Lucy Daniels, so without a way for them to add to and look after the site, the project simply couldn't operate.
The branding didn't reflect the work, and wasn't accessible. The look didn't convey the expertise behind Attuned, and the colours and type fell short of accessibility standards.
No one knew how to turn the material into modern courses. All the team had were years-old PowerPoint presentations and speaker notes. Nobody knew how to shape those into polished, professional online courses that matched the new brand.
Business needs
Branding that reflects the expertise and credibility of Lucy Daniels.
A platform the team can maintain and add to themselves.
Guidance on the best way to turn their PowerPoint presentations into modern online courses.
A way to meet the grant's requirements: completion surveys, and accreditation so the courses carry NC professional-development credit.
User needs
A platform that feels professional and trustworthy.
An experience that makes it easy to enrol, move through a course, and earn a certificate.
Research
Gathering Insights
I didn't want to take the brief at face value and just build what was asked for. Before designing anything, I went back to a more basic question: what is Attuned really for?
I set out to understand:
Why the training began as in-person workshops in the first place
Why the Center wanted to bring it online now
Why they were so committed to keeping it free
Why earning professional-development credit mattered so much to educators
To answer those, I:
Ran discovery sessions over Zoom with Deb
Sent questionnaires to Deb and the wider Lucy Daniels team
Researched other online learning platforms for what worked and what didn't
Dug into the Division of Child Development criteria for NC professional-development credit
Understanding the motivations, not just the feature list, is what let me solve the real problem, and it shaped every decision that followed.
Defining the direction
Attuned is a mission, not a product. Lucy Daniels know their work changes outcomes, for the teachers they train and the children and families those teachers support. It began as free, in-person workshops; going online was simply a way to reach more people at their own pace, and keeping it free is central to that.
Decision: lead with warmth and the depth of expertise behind the work, and strip out any friction (cost, rigid scheduling) that would narrow who it reaches.
Teachers have almost no spare time.
Decision: mobile-first, so they can learn wherever they are, and bite-size modules so progress fits into small windows rather than demanding a clear afternoon.
Two audiences, not one. Looking at how educators in North Carolina find professional development, I learned that teachers often seek out courses themselves, but school administrators actively look for training to share with their staff.
Decision: the design and copy speak to both, the individual teacher and the administrator choosing on behalf of a team.
Their time has to pay off twice. Earning professional-development credit means the hours spent count toward their requirements, not just their knowledge.
Decision: build the quiz-and-score path to credit, secure Division of Child Development approval for NC credits, and make that value clear up front.
Overall, the research confirmed something the old website completely hid: Attuned is a heart-led, warm, and genuinely passionate project, with a huge amount of knowledge and experience behind it. That gap, between what Attuned is and what the site said it was, became the real brief for the redesign.
The Brand
The starting point. The inherited logo was a single, inflexible lockup: a stiff multi-colour hand, a heavy wordmark fighting a light italic tagline, oversaturated colours, and no secondary mark, so it broke down on mobile and anywhere responsive. The research had also been clear that Attuned's credibility rests on its link to the Lucy Daniels Center, and the old brand didn't carry that either. So I had two things to hold together: make it warm and inviting, and tie it credibly back to Lucy Daniels.
Iteration one: warmth and a wordmark. I chose Quicksand for a clean, professional feel that's also rounder and warmer, and built a wordmark around it, playing with the "a" as a reusable monogram. The letterforms took cues from children's drawings and the calm, fluid movement at the heart of Attuned's classroom work, echoing the swirl in the Lucy Daniels heart motif. I softened Lucy Daniels' own palette (teal and sky blue for professionalism, yellow and soft pink for warmth) and replaced the blunt "Powered by Lucy Daniels Center" tagline with "Affective Teacher Training." Deb and I both liked it, but it felt too removed from Lucy Daniels, and since that connection was a core research finding, liking it wasn't enough.
Iteration two: tying it to Lucy Daniels. I took the orange heart-and-swirl from the Lucy Daniels logo, deconstructed it, and built it into the "a" of attuned, keeping the monogram idea from the first round. Now the mark reads unmistakably as a Lucy Daniels project. This was the one Deb was thrilled with.
An accessible, on-brand palette. The palette still felt a step removed, so I brought in Lucy Daniels' signature orange. Theirs isn't accessible, so I deepened it for contrast and used it in place of the teal as the accent for buttons and calls to action, where it stands out far better.
A flexible system, not a single logo. Where the old brand had one rigid lockup, I built a set: a primary logo with the "Affective Teacher Education" tagline for print and flyers, a secondary wordmark for the desktop header, and a tertiary monogram for mobile and small placements (they would even work as stickers), each with colour and dark-background versions.
Colour as wayfinding. I assigned the three lighter tones (pink, yellow, sky blue) to the three courses (Relationships, Communication, Environment), so they are colour-coded for quick recognition, distinct from the CTA colour, and reinforced with clear labels.
One typeface, clear hierarchy. Quicksand runs throughout; I used weight and case (semibold headings, bold uppercase sub-heads, regular body) to build hierarchy without piling on competing fonts, keeping it clean but easy to scan.
Designing the site
Beyond the courses, I designed the whole site around the two things an educator needs to work out fast: what Attuned is, and whether it is for them.
I designed every page: Home, About, The Team, the main Courses page, FAQ, and Contact, plus up-to-date Terms & Conditions, Privacy Policy, and an Accessibility Statement, drafted so Deb could have them checked by Lucy Daniels' lawyer.
The layout had to be two things at once: warm and friendly, but clean and professional. The pages tell the story of who Attuned is and who they serve, while keeping every piece of information clear enough that an educator can quickly see what is on offer, whether it fits them, and how to get started.
To hold attention, I leaned on a few deliberate patterns:
Clearly marked sections with plenty of white space
Short, scannable text blocks rather than walls of copy
Fixed background images that each section slides over as you scroll, giving a sense of momentum that keeps you moving down the page.
Accessibility
Accessibility was a first-class goal, not a pass at the end. I rebuilt the colour palette and typography and made sure contrast held up, checking against WCAG 2.1. (Optional: add the audit summary or a link once finalised.)
Building The Courses
This was the heart of the project: turning three courses' worth of dated material into modern, credible training. Each course has four modules, twelve in total, each rebuilt as one repeatable pattern I could reuse across them all (which is exactly why the twelve new modules can now slot straight in).
Redesigned every slide in Figma so the visuals felt current, consistent, and on-brand.
Added a voiceover to each module, produced in Descript. On a tight budget, an AI voiceover was what made polished modules possible at all, but with a firm line: every word and all the research came from the Lucy Daniels teachers and clinicians. The AI narrated; it never authored. And we were transparent throughout that the voice is synthetic.
Rewrote the narration to sound human. The speaker notes read as notes, not narration, so I reworked each transcript to flow naturally and fill the gaps, then sent every one to Deb, so the final wording always came from Lucy Daniels.
Set each course up on the platform. The site runs on LearnPress, which handles enrolment and course navigation, so my job was to configure the courses and quizzes correctly, add a certificate to each course, and integrate an end-of-course survey (a grant requirement) so the Center can evidence impact. Passing the quiz earns learners a score toward professional credit.
By the numbers: 3 courses · 12 modules · 12 videos · 12 quizzes · 3 end-of-course surveys.
Designing for a team with no capacity to run it
This is the part I'm proudest of. Attuned is run by volunteers, with no one sitting behind the website keeping it going, so "easy to run" couldn't mean "well-documented manual tasks." It had to mean the platform looks after itself.
So I set it up to run hands-off. Once a learner enrols, the platform carries them all the way through with no admin involved:
Course access, progress, and the emails learners receive are all automatic
Certificates are issued on completion without anyone lifting a finger
The end-of-course survey collects itself, ready for the Center's grant reporting
Any enquiries route straight to the admin at Lucy Daniels
And for the rare moments a human does need to step in, updating a line of text, checking survey results, I left tutorial videos and written guides, so nothing depends on me being reachable.
The one thing that deliberately stays specialist is building new courses: that is skilled design and production work, not a job for a volunteer. Which is the best endorsement the project could have. The Center now wants twelve more modules, and that work is likely coming back to me.
The Outcome
Stat blocks:
34 educators surveyed early on, with near-universal positive ratings
12 more modules now funded for expansion
3 courses live, built on a repeatable system so growth slots straight in
On the strength of that early response, the Lucy Daniels Center is pursuing further grant funding to expand the platform, and because the courses run on the repeatable module/quiz/survey system I built, that growth slots straight in rather than needing a rebuild.
"The ATTUNED website is really a success so far." Deb, ATTUNED
